Rowan manages to take an item from the grave without her mother knowing. The edge fits perfectly along the fracture line in the skeleton's skull.īefore they can observe anything else, Rowan's mother returns home,finds them with the skeleton and calls the police and her husband. Just past the skull James pulls out a brick with dark stains and hair along it's edge. Rowan also notices thin cracks in the skull as though it's been shattered. The two of them check out the skeleton and find what looks like blood splatter on the shirt and pants and a gun. She decides to call her best friend, James Galvez because the skeleton, despite looking like it's been there for many years, suggests foul play. Rowan decides to investigate and discovers a hole cut in the floor of the old house has exposed a skeleton dumped facedown in a roll of stiff fabric. The workers abruptly stop their work and quickly leave, talking about 'old bones', 'police' and 'murder'.

Rowan's father Tim who is white, did not want to do anything to the back house, but her mother Isis who is black wants it renovated as a guest house. The house has been in Rowan's father's family since her great-great-grandfather, who founded the Chase oil company. Rowan reflects back on what began the first Monday of summer vacation, the day workers arrived at her house. She's decided to walk because she wants think about what happened almost one hundred years ago, in 1921 when Will, Joseph and Rose ran north into the woods and fields to try to survive. Seventeen-year-old Rowan Chase is on her way to an appointment with the district attorney at the county courthouse.

The first narrative is set in current day Tulsa, Oklahoma. Latham's dual narrative, Dreamland Burning is set in current day Tulsa and 1921 Tulsa.

Dreamland burning book